LONDON ALERT (20 page)

4. At least ten minutes before the cruise missile is due (i.e.
 
at 03
.50 for 04.
00) power up the laser
as above and when ready, shine it on Nelson’s chest for a moment to get your
eye in again.

5. Switch the laser off as mentioned by pulling hard back on
the trigger and releasing it, but keep it powered up and wait for the arrival
of the missile. Shortly before its arrival, a harmless explosive device making
a loud bang and a nasty-smelling cloud will detonate at the foot of the column
to disperse any people congregated there.

6. On hearing the detonation, you will switch on the laser
and shine it on Nelson’s chest as instructed.

7. Once the cruise missile has hit the admiral and almost
certainly knocked him off his perch, switch off the laser, and return it to its
case. DO NOT DRAW ATTENTION TO YOURSELF BY SWITCHING ON THE TV OR RADIO TO
LEARN THE RESULT OF YOUR HANDIWORK.

8.
At 7
.
30 a.m. someone will come to
your room to collect the case. You will only hand it over after they have given
you the password, which is Nelson’s flag signal to his fleet at the Battle of
Trafalgar: ‘England expects every man to do his duty.’

ENSURE
YOU HAVE TAKEN OUT THE MOBILE PHONE, and have breakfast in your room. (Remember
to order it for 8
.
00 a.m. from room service
before retiring.)

9. Leave the hotel (with the mobile phone) at nine o’clock
without checking out. Turn right and walk south to
St
James’s Park. Cross The
Mall and go 100 yards or so towards Buckingham Palace, until you reach the path
to the bridge across the lake, which you will take. Once on the bridge,
switch
on
the mobile phone for further instructions.

10. Before leaving your room, tear this sheet into small
pieces and dispose of it down the toilet and flush it three times, allowing a
pause between each flush.

The Owl

Holt replaced the
instructions in the silver case and sat in the armchair, waiting for his club
sandwich. The long wait might mean the person bringing it would be from
Giraffe. So when it did finally arrive, Holt gave the boy a searching look that
was misinterpreted. Seeing his discomfiture, Holt concluded he was genuine and neither
from Giraffe nor the Owl. The way he hovered for his tip confirmed it.

Every noise in the
corridor raised his hopes, only for them to be dashed as the sound of retreating
footsteps got weaker and weaker. It seemed he would be unable to warn Giraffe,
and the responsibility would rest entirely on his shoulders. Then he heard some
knocks at the doors of adjoining rooms, followed by a sharp knock at his own. A
female voice that he instantly recognized called out,
‘Housekeeping
.’

‘Coming
,’
he answered as he hurriedly opened the door to find Celia standing there in a
snappy hotel uniform with a white pinafore in front.

Expressionless and
feigning not to know each other, they stood rooted to the ground for a moment.

‘Would you like me to
turn down the bed, sir?’

‘If you insist. I would
appreciate it, though it’s not really necessary.’

She pushed her trolley
with housekeeping materials in the doorway to prevent the door shutting.

‘It’s a rule at the
hotel that we maids, even the older ones, keep the door ajar when doing the
rooms – and especially when a male guest is present.’

‘I quite understand. In
your case, I am sure it is a particularly wise precaution.’

‘You naughty man!’

Playing the part to the
full, she came in and walked to the bedside, unnecessarily wiggling her behind under
her tight skirt. Was she was winding him up on purpose, notwithstanding the
gravity of the situation? Or perhaps she could not help it, having got into the
habit of toying with her VIPs.

Just as she was about
to bend over to fold over the bedcover, Holt came up beside her, with his right
hip obscuring the view of her left thigh from behind – straight ahead there was
only the window, where there could hardly be a hidden camera – and slipped the beermat
with his message into her apron pocket, pushing hard against her upper thigh so
she could not fail to realize what he was doing. He had never before pushed
against her there and found it an agreeable sensation that he would have liked to
have prolonged, but he quickly stepped away.

‘Is there anything else,
sir?’

‘Nothing that I would
dare ask you for. Thanks all the same. I don’t want to end up like DSK.’

‘Who?’

‘Dominique Strauss-Kahn.
You know, the French head of the International Monetary Fund. The man expected
to become the next French president who threw it all away by allegedly
importuning the maid who had come to service his New York hotel room, just as
you are doing now.’

‘I don’t know whether I
should be flattered or insulted. But thank you, sir. Have a good night, alone.’

And then she was gone.
Had she lingered for longer, it could have raised suspicions. Holt had kept
talking loudly so he would not be suspected of having whispered something in her
ear.

Relieved at having been
able to inform Giraffe about what he was about to do, Holt found the sight of Celia
had made him take stock of his situation. How he wished he were back with her in
the fold at Farringdon, doing what he had initially signed up to do.

Would Celia read what
he had written, or would a motorcycle courier be standing by to take it
straight to Sir Charles? Unlikely, as someone might be watching. Even if she
did not read it, she would surely make the link after the toppling of Nelson
and realize he had graduated to the big time. That would make her respect him,
but not a lot of good that would do him if he were no longer of this world to
exploit it.

Too late for second
thoughts; he turned on the television and started on his club sandwich. It is
said one can judge a hotel by its club sandwiches, and this one was not bad at
all; not that he could enjoy it with all that was on his mind.

There were some news
flashes saying that the BBC and other news organizations had received warnings
that something was going to happen in London that night, but no loss of life
was expected. Apparently the event was to be a wake-up call that would
precede a number of events in the coming weeks to prompt the government to stop
the rot – the country did not deserve its heroes.

He watched some more
television, hoping it would help him relax, but could not concentrate. Giving
up, he had a shower, then set the digital clock alarm for 3
.
15 a.m. and tried to get
some sleep.

He lay in bed wondering
what Sir Charles and the government would do. Would they have the cruise
missile shot down? Would they try and make it deviate from its course and risk
it detonating elsewhere in central London? At least Trafalgar Square would be a
large, virtually empty space at that time of the night. His guess was that they
would think the success of his mission so important that they would do nothing.

It took him some time
to drop off to sleep, and when he eventually did it was again only fitfully, with
him constantly checking to see how long remained before the alarm would go off.

When it finally did sound,
he got up immediately and pulled back the curtains to have a look at Nelson,
who if everything went according to plan would soon no longer be there. With so
much light pollution over central London, he would have been able to see him without
the dim floodlight always illuminating him, as he faced south almost straight
down Whitehall.

From where Holt was
looking, the right-hand side of the admiral’s chest, where he was to aim, was in
full view and presumably would be where the missile would hit.

As he could not see the
foot of the column, he wondered whether there might be some hapless tourists
sitting underneath. He was glad the detonation that the Owl had mentioned would
scatter them. There was nothing he could do, and perhaps it was better he could
not see them.

He made a coffee and on
finishing it turned out the bedside light and waited, having checked the laser
had ample charge. There was ten minutes to go.

A little sooner than
necessary, he switched on the laser power supply and listened to the hum, which
quietened when the green light showed it was fully powered up.

He already had the
window open, and nothing but the cool night air separated him from the statue. He
pulled on the trigger but not hard enough to lock it and shone the laser on the
admiral for a few moments, surprised at how relaxed he was now the great moment
had come. More to the point was his relief that he would be targeting an inanimate
object rather than a living being.

Everything seemed
perfectly in order; all he had to do was to wait. He eased back on the trigger
and rested the laser – he did not want to be tired and shaky when the time came.

Big Ben in the distance
was striking the hour, but no sign of the missile. His digital clock was now showing
4
.01.
10. Where on earth was it?

Even though he had been
waiting for it, when it came, the loud bang from the square took him by
surprise. Squeezing hard down on the laser trigger to lock it, he aimed at the admiral’s
chest. Though the red spot was very obvious to him when looking through the
telescopic sight, he was sure it would be hardly noticeable to anyone in the
square, whose attention would anyway have been drawn downwards towards the sound
and, presumably, smoke generated at the foot of the column.

Holt had expected the cruise
missile to come up Whitehall – the route he had taken on coming to the hotel –
as it would have provided a clear run to Nelson straight ahead. Instead, the
500 mph missile came over Buckingham Palace and down The Mall, veering to the
left 300 yards before the end to skim right over his head, where it locked on to
the target he had designated. Only afterwards did he realize the Owl had avoided
sending the missile along Whitehall, where it could have been shot down by the ground-to-air
missiles one would expect to be defending key government buildings.

There was no flash or
explosion. The missile’s momentum alone had been enough.

Nelson was no longer
there.

Holt
got up at
seven
and turned on the television
,
just
as any normal
guest
would.

Virtually all the main channels had extensive
coverage of the felling of Nelson. The TV stations and media organizations had
received phone calls from someone calling himself the Owl, claiming
responsibility for the action at Trafalgar Square – carried out because the
country no longer merited such a hero. According to the Owl, the country had
sunk to such a low that those attending the next Remembrance Day ceremony at
the Cenotaph to commemorate those who gave their lives in the world wars should
hang their heads in shame.

At exactly 7
.
30 there was a knock at his
door, which Holt opened holding the silver case in his left hand. The woman in
a room maid’s uniform gave the password, and he handed over the case with the
laser target-designator without further ado.

Closing the door, he felt very pleased with himself. Not
only had he completed the initiation test without a hitch and without having to
assassinate anyone, let alone the prime minister, he had also covered his
official backside by forewarning Giraffe, and he had impressed Celia into the
bargain.

With few hard facts, the
early-morning TV news coverage was reduced to repeatedly showing clips of the
sandstone statue of Lord Nelson lying shattered on the ground, just as it had
repeatedly shown Saddam Hussein’s toppled statue in Baghdad.

The newscasts said that
just before the arrival of the cruise missile, someone had let off a loud percussion
grenade at the foot of the column. This had emitted a nauseating smell, causing
the five people sitting at its base to move well away. The newscasters were able
to interview the individuals concerned, who considered themselves mighty lucky.
One even said how considerate the terrorists had been to make them scatter
before Nelson arrived on their heads.

The BBC’s authoritative security correspondent,
Frank Gardner, was saying the government had no idea as to who the Owl might
be, and that the incident differed from almost all others in that great care
had been taken to avoid loss of life – as evidenced by the detonation of a
device at the foot of the column to cause anyone there to move away.

As the government had
been forewarned, Holt knew they could have shot down the cruise missile or sent
it off course. As he had surmised, the prime minister must have considered his
mission so important that it was worth taking the flak from the press, who, as
usual, not knowing the whole story, were already accusing the secret services of
bungling.

Anyway, Holt had the satisfaction
of proving himself to both parties.

None of the so-called
experts trotted out on TV and the radio on such occasions knew what to make of
it. Much of traditional England was in a state of shock, seeing their most
famous hero toppled in such a dramatic manner. Holt could not help kicking
himself for not having thought up the idea himself – it was just the sort of outlandish
scenario Sir Charles would have admired and expected him to have come up with.

On the dot of
9 a.m.,
 
he walked out of the hotel, with
no one paying much attention, as the staff were constantly nipping into the office
or the breakfast room to see the TVs there and try and find out what had
happened just outside their door during the night. However, as Holt exited the
hotel, a policeman moved towards him as if about to question him, but before
the officer had taken more than a couple of steps, a tall figure standing
nearby quickly stepped in, showed an ID, and told him to back off. The service was
protecting him, for if he were taken into custody even temporarily, he might be
compromised and at the very least suspected of having revealed something.

He had not anticipated
the amount of disruption his night’s work would cause. Trafalgar Square was a
traffic node, transited by many bus routes, not to mention other vehicles. With
the square cordoned off as a crime scene, all this traffic had been diverted,
causing total gridlock. Much of central London was at a standstill. No wonder he
had been told to walk and catch an underground train outside the immediate area.

 On exiting the hotel,
he turned right and walked down Spring Gardens, past the life-size white horse
sculpture outside the British Council building, with its often ignored notice
telling people not to mount it, and crossed The Mall at the first spot with an
island midway across. He walked a hundred yards to the right towards Buckingham
Palace, then turned left onto the footpath leading to the bridge across the
lake.

 Someone must have been
watching or tracking him via his mobile phone – which he had, as instructed, switched
on as he had entered the park – for it rang when he was halfway across. A voice
said, ‘Go to
St
 
James’s tube station and
take an underground train to Bank station, and from there walk along Leadenhall
Street to London Bridge. Cross the bridge on the left-hand side, during which
time you will receive further orders.’

Holt began to feel a
trifle uneasy. He had detected a change in tone in the communications. Prior to
the initiation test, it had always been a matter of instructions; now it was curt
orders. Was it because they considered him to already be part of their
organization and were taking him for granted, or was there some other
significance? Still, there was nothing he could do. He would have to wait and
find out – somewhat like the waiting period before he had been accepted for the
service.

The paralysis of road
traffic in central London meant the underground was packed, and he had to wait
for the third train before he was able to squeeze his way on, and then only
with difficulty. He was glad to be getting off at Bank only a few stops
distant. With such a crush, he had to be careful not to slip down into the wide
gap between the curved platform and the train at that station.

In keeping with the
station name, the imposing building of the Bank of England was just outside. Five
minutes’ walk along Leadenhall Street brought him to London Bridge. As
instructed, he crossed over to the left-hand side. And again, when halfway
across the bridge, his phone rang, with the voice saying, ‘At the traffic
lights at the end of the bridge, cross over to the other side of the first
street, called Tooley Street, and turn left on the other side so you are
walking parallel to the railway lines and the River Thames. Walk along Tooley
Street for about three hundred metres, until you come to a road tunnel passing under
the railway tracks. Turn right into the tunnel and walk straight ahead on the right-hand
side, with the traffic coming towards you.’

The pavement on the
other side of Tooley Street was crowded with people going to the underground and
railway stations. Also, there were queues consisting mostly of families waiting
to visit the London Dungeon for a scare. After weaving his way through the
crowd, Holt finally reached the entrance to the tunnel under the railway lines and
turned into it.

Dark, dank, and
depressing, the tunnel was a long one, with the sheer volume of traffic of all
sorts coming through towards him adding to his discomfort. Why choose such a god-awful
place? To think a week before he had been on the sunny Côte d’Azur.

On reaching the halfway
point, he could see the daylight at the exit beckoning him, but just then two
ambulances, one behind the other with sirens blaring, screeched to a stop alongside
him, leaving a gap between them which happened to be exactly abreast of him. As
he was wondering why they should stop there, with no sign of anyone injured
either in the road or on the pavement, he heard the nearside rear door of the
leading ambulance behind him spring open 180 degrees. He could see it not only blocked
his retreat but also would prevent anyone walking along the pavement behind him
from seeing him. Likewise, the nearside door of the ambulance in front of him had
sprung open, blocking the view of anyone ahead.

Two well-built men
wearing balaclavas came out from nowhere to grab him. Taken by surprise, he put
up no resistance as they bundled him into the back of the leading ambulance and
held him still while a nurse with her face obscured by a surgical mask pressed
a cloth soaked in chloroform over his mouth and nose. Even before he had lost
consciousness, the ambulance had begun to move.

The whole operation having
only taken about twelve seconds, the ambulance was out of the tunnel so quickly
that no one observing from above would have imagined anything untoward had
happened in the interim.

On failing to see Holt exit
the tunnel, anyone watching from a helicopter or later looking at satellite images
would have been unable to determine in which of the many vehicles entering and exiting
the tunnel he would have been. Also, from above it would have been impossible
to note the registration number on their number plates. Anyway, they were
probably waiting for him to walk out of the other end of the tunnel. As
evidenced before, the Owl was certainly a clever operator.

Holt’s memories of his subsequent
interrogation were vague. He finally woke up to find himself in bed in a
darkened room with wires linking him to a monitor, which must have triggered an
alert, for a nurse soon came in and turned up the light.

As the nurse’s face was
obscured by a mask, like that of the one who had held the pad soaked in
chloroform to his mouth in the ambulance, he could not tell whether it was the
same one.

‘How do we feel?’ she
asked as though it really mattered to her.

‘My head hurts.’

‘That’s to be expected
in view of what we have been through this last week, or couple of weeks, my
dear. What would you like for breakfast?’

The ‘
my dear’
and the royal ‘
we’
made the nurse sound almost kindly. Was this some good-cop, bad-cop scenario?
Or was she mimicking the nurses in
Dr
No’s
lair to psyche him out? He had been interrogated or kept unconscious for
goodness knows how long surely to disorientate him time-wise.

‘Coffee most of all,’
he replied.

He had no idea what
time of day it was. He did not even know what day of the week or of the month
it was.

Could he have fallen by
mistake into the hands of operatives of another government department, who did
not realize he was one of them? He might have admitted toppling Nelson, thereby
raising their suspicions. Everything was a blur.

He did not ask for much
for breakfast, just juice, more coffee, and toast. When the nurse had cleared
that away, she gave him his instructions.

‘You must prepare
yourself for your make-or-break meeting with His Wisdom. To start with, you
need a shower and a shave. Also, you must clean your teeth and comb your hair
and evacuate your bowels – I can give you an enema, if you like.’

‘Thanks very much, but
no thanks.’

‘Always trying to
help.’

‘What do you mean,
“
His
Wisdom
”?’

‘The Owl, of course. He
will be watching you, though you will not actually be able to see him. Besides,
you yourself will feel better if you are cleaned up and decent. To tell the
truth, you look awful, my darling.’

‘Thanks very much…love.’

‘You can talk like that
to me, but you must address the Owl as
Your Wisdom
.’

‘Really?’

‘Yes. It’s no different
from calling an ambassador
Your Excellency
or the Queen
Your Majesty
. After you’ve done it several times, it will
roll off your tongue. Remember this is, as I just said, going to be your make-or-break
session.’

Holt considered asking
her what make or break meant, but finally thought better of it. She would not
know much anyway, though the mention of the word ‘
make’
implied a possible positive outcome, whatever that might be. All he knew about
owls was that they could see into the far distance in dim light at night,
rotate their head 270 degrees, and had wings that enabled them to descend
noiselessly without alerting their prey, somewhat like fifth-generation
stealth aircraft.

After the shower and
shave in the en suite bathroom, he did indeed feel better. No need for help
from the nurse, who meanwhile had been busying herself in his room.